


I Will Be Your Remedy

by batsgalore



Category: DCU, Nightwing (Comics)
Genre: Coma, F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Sickness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-10
Updated: 2017-12-10
Packaged: 2019-02-12 19:03:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,620
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12966291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/batsgalore/pseuds/batsgalore
Summary: Dick gets sick and wakes up to his girlfriend freaking out about something he feels he should know.





	I Will Be Your Remedy

Dick awoke to a fuzzy mumbling in his ear. He felt the crisp coolness of morning on his nose and lips, the rest of his body curled under a large fleece blanket. He peeled his eyes open wider and let his eyes adjust to the bright room around him, immediately regretting leaving his curtains open from last night. The mumbling was clearer now, a woman’s voice coming from the outside of his room. It was Barbara, his on again-off again girlfriend. She had come over the night before for a friendly check-up on her sick boyfriend.

“Yes, I’ve tried everything!” Barbara stressed over to whoever she was talking to. Dick tried to comprehend exactly what she was yelling about this time.

A short pause passed and Dick assumed it was in the time the person was responding. She was on the phone with someone.

“No, Bruce, it isn’t making anything better. He’s been sleeping for more than 24 hours and I’m beginning to freak out here.” Barbara responded, trying to lower her voice.

Bruce? When had Bruce entered the equation? What wasn’t making anything better? Who’s been sleeping for that long? Why was his head throbbing in pain?!

Barbara let out a loud sigh and Dick knew she hung up with Bruce. She opened the door quietly and Dick slammed his eyes shut so she wouldn’t know he was eavesdropping.

She sat on the bed next to him, her backside facing him. Dick thought he heard a small sob as she curled into herself, drawing her hands up to cover her face. He was still confused on who she was talking about and why it concerned Bruce. He finally decided to intervene.

“Babs?” Dick heard himself say. His voice was slurred and groggy and it only hurt his head more to open his mouth.

Barbara snapped around with wide eyes and drew in a loud and surprised gasp, “Dick?! You’re awake?! Oh my God I thought I lost you!” 

The end of her sentence was muffled by Dick’s shoulder. Dick tried to remember when exactly she launched herself onto him. All he remembered was the pain of her landing. She sobbed into his shirt, her freckled shoulders rising and falling. 

“What happened? Why were you on the phone with Bruce? What’s wrong?” He asked. At least, he thought he asked. His words were slurred and incomprehensible in his ears. Barbara sat up and looked at him in confusion.

“What?” She sniffled, wiping her face.

“What’s wrong? Why were you on the phone with Bruce?” Dick tried to repeat himself but only felt his tongue as something in the way of his speech. He couldn’t seem to move it right.

“Dick,” Barbara sat up fully, concern now washing over her body language, “You aren’t speaking right, there’s something wrong with you.”

Dick felt frustration creeping into his veins. His head felt like it was run over by a tank. All he wanted to know was what was wrong. With her, with Bruce, and now with himself. Dick opened his mouth again to speak but this time words wouldn’t come. A breath hitched in his throat and his eyes began to sting. Was he crying now? Why was he crying? He wasn’t even in that much pain.

“Dick, stop trying to speak, you’re stressing yourself out. I can’t have you going into another coma.” Barbara scowled, reaching for her phone again. 

Coma? Now he had another thing to worry about, another thing that confused him even the more. He hadn’t fallen into a coma...had he? He felt like he slept for maybe seven hours, eight if he was lucky. But everything was slowly making sense now. He didn’t know how he hadn’t seen it sooner, he was the son of the World’s Greatest Detective for heaven’s sake! He was the problem, he was what was wrong. 

Dick reached up to grab Barbara’s hand so she couldn’t call Bruce back. He wanted to tell her he was fine and that he didn’t need Bruce’s attention. Dick could handle himself. 

“I need to call Bruce, Dick,” she said as she pried his hand from hers, “You’re not in any good shape right now. He’s coming anyways, I just need to tell him your after-effects.” 

Dick felt his frustration coming back, stronger this time, and he grabbed her wrist again. His face begged her not to call, he didn’t need his father hovering over him. He’d felt selfish enough with all the ‘damsel in distress’ calls he made for Bruce. Dick was old enough now, he really could do without Batman’s worrying.

“Babsss,” Dick whined, trying his best to make words with his dead fish of a tongue, “‘M okaaay!”

“No, you’re not okay. I’m calling him whether you like it or not.” She hissed.

He watched her leave the room and close the door behind her. The muffle of her’s and Bruce’s conversation starting up again. He closed his eyes and tried to slow his breathing, he was letting his anger take control of him, he always did. He’d always criticize others for being too angry, too reckless. But all he was was a hypocrite in his own anger, letting it guide him through too many of his decisions. 

Dick opened his eyes another time and tried to take a deep breath, not seeming to get enough air. He looked up at his ceiling and examined the small details of the popcorn design. He saw how it rose and fell and curved and chipped. He felt exhaustion seeping to his eyelids, making them weigh tons each. But he’d only been awake for so long, not long enough to be tired again. Too much stress and tension in his muscles to feel tired. He couldn’t figure out why he was so tired, why he’d gone into a coma, why Babs was on the phone with his father, why time felt to move so...slow.

 

Dick awoke to cold fingers brushing his forehead and the sides of his neck. He opened his eyes to see Bruce standing over him, a hint of concern visible on his face. He felt a metal object touch his chest that was now bare, a stethoscope held by Bruce. He watched as Bruce’s face wince in distress. It was for a nanosecond before it faded back to its seemingly permanent, apathetic state.

“Bruce, am I okay?” Dick asked. His tongue finally decided to cooperate and do its job. He didn’t think he was truly worried about himself, but it seemed to sound through his voice that he in fact was. 

Bruce looked down to him and sighed, tugging his lips into a weak smile. Bruce was exhausted, perhaps not physically but rather mentally. He’d heard that his son had gone into a coma and couldn’t speak right once he awoke. He couldn’t bear to lose him...again. 

He decided to brush Dick’s hair back another time as an answer. He looked down at his pitiful son and took in the sight of him in his state. Dick was vulnerable, weak, yet he pulled through to the end, almost running himself into the ground. He wanted to tell him how proud he was of his son, how he had proven himself to be independent and strong even without his father’s guiding hand. Dick Grayson truly was the only the thing Bruce Wayne made right. 

“I’ll see you two later,” Bruce sighed as he closed his medical briefcase that Alfred, surprisingly, let him borrow, “Get some good rest, Dick. Babs’ll let you know what’s wrong after I give her the report on your symptoms.”

“Since when were you a doctor, Bruce? I thought that was Alfred’s field, he guards it like a dog.”

“Alfred is on vacation right now in England, he doesn’t need to stress about this right now.”

That explained why Bruce held the briefcase.

Bruce squeezed Dick’s shoulder before he walked out with a nod. 

“You’ll be fine, Dick,” Barbara’s firm voice spoke. Dick turned his head on his pillow to see her sitting in a chair. Her glasses glared against the light of her laptop that she seemed too focused on. “You fell into a coma due to lack of oxygen to your brain. You had a bad case of pneumonia and your nervous system couldn’t handle it. On top op that, your lungs weren’t working right so you couldn’t breathe too well. Explains why you kept blacking out.”

Dick stared at his girlfriend in admiration. She wasn’t only the most beautiful woman he’d ever known, but she was also the smartest, most amazing, most perfect woman he’d ever known. He watched as she tucked her crimson hair behind her ear and her green eyes gleamed behind her glasses. He wondered how he was blessed with such a beauty that stayed with him. That put up with all the hell he put her through with their overly complicated relationship. He never stopped to think about it, his feet were always in the air, his head always in the clouds. He owed her so much, too much. 

“You’re perfect, Babs, you know that?” Dick grinned, changing the subject.

Barbara looked up to him and eyes him suspiciously. She was caught off guard and tried to hide her obvious blush that spread over her cheeks. 

“Dick, you just woke from a coma, can you not flirt for once?” 

“Hey, what can I say? You’re a beaut, it’s not like I’m not gonna say something.”

She rolled her eyes and looked back to her computer. Dick just kept smiling and staring and smiling and staring. Even after the physical pain he went through, just the sight Barbara helped him through it.

**Author's Note:**

> yeah, i kinda write all over the place and it usually ends in people realizing how lucky they are even when dealt the worst hand? i really try with angst but i always flock to fluff. anyways, hope you enjoyed!


End file.
